Euronews Serbia reveals what Brent Sadler wrote in his reports on N1’s operations

Photo: PIUS UTOMI EKPEI / AFP / Profimedia

Brent Sadler, a multiawardwinning international journalist—whom media controlled by United Group say will replace Aleksandra Subotić, a close associate of United Media’s minority owner Dragan Šolak—gave an interview to the Croatian weekly Nacional about the future of the TV channels N1 and Nova S.

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Eleven years ago, Sadler was among the key figures behind the launch of N1 television in Croatia, Serbia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina. As chair of the N1 Editorial Board, he drafted editorial guidelines, filed performance reports, appointed key editors, and upheld CNN standards. However, after several years he left the post due to internal turmoil and a clash with Dragan Šolak, one of United Media’s coowners.

The Euronews Serbia newsroom has seen Sadler’s reports. They state that Dragan Šolak actively took part in editorial board meetings, that N1 was used to run a campaign in Šolak’s economic interests—such as in the case of the Belgrade Golf Club—and that the “Harding report” mysteriously disappeared.

“Under the Luxembourg licensing structure, the N1 Editorial Board is supposed to be the body responsible for all questions of broadcasting and editorial policy at N1. In practice, that was not the case. Instead, the Luxembourg editorial board largely served as a proforma entity, without welldefined or transparent rules and functions for professional editorial governance,” reads Sadler’s January 2018 report.

“Soon after N1 launched, United Group’s president, Dragan Šolak, began regularly attending and actively participating in editorial board meetings. United Media and N1 CEO Aleksandra Subotić also attended. Although Sadler chaired N1’s board meetings, it became obvious to everyone present that DS (Dragan Šolak) wielded the real power over the editorial board.”

The report also says that, “in other instances,” Šolak “called news directors to account for what he claimed were editorial lapses, particularly if the coverage might harm United Group’s interests.”

According to the report, he behaved “arrogantly, offensively, and in a threatening manner” toward two news directors on at least two occasions. In one especially sharp dressingdown that lasted more than 20 minutes, the N1 Belgrade director was accused of damaging UG’s interests.

It further states that “N1/United Media director Aleksandra Subotić often sent warnings to news directors to ‘pay attention’ to the group’s press releases. Although nobody was required to run them on N1, those instructions were always followed.”

The report adds that the interests of the group or its shareholders often seeped into N1’s reporting.

“For example, on September 27, 2018, Aleksandra Subotić instructed N1 Belgrade’s news director, Jugoslav Ćosić, to arrange contact between an N1 reporter and United Group’s general counsel, Steve Leroy. She directed that the reporter ask Leroy two specific questions. Ćosić later ensured the story aired on N1, including Leroy’s statement with the prescribed questions.”

“Sadler noted that resolving such issues was not always possible—and certainly not without difficulty. In trying to explain why standards exist and must be respected, N1’s CEO, Aleksandra Subotić—who is not a journalist—consistently failed to grasp that N1 must avoid crossing the line between commercialism and journalism,” the report says.

It also says that “Subotić often complained about the ‘laziness’ of the Belgrade news director,” but “no measures were taken to correct the situation, despite Sadler’s constant appeals.”

The report notes that James Harding of the BBC held numerous meetings in the region, accompanied by Kit Blekmor (a former BBC editorinchief) and Brent Sadler of N1. The United Group president had earlier instructed Sadler to ensure full transparency from N1.

“Before his report was presented, United Group’s VP for corporate affairs, Dragica Pilipović Čefi, told Harding over dinner in Belgrade that she had at one time run a campaign via N1 to pressure local authorities to back down in a dispute over the future of the Belgrade Golf Club, in which DS (Dragan Šolak) had an interest. Harding later said he was surprised she mentioned this, as it was a clear example of interference in N1’s editorial policy. Later, after Harding left the region, Čefi contacted Sadler to ask whether she could see a draft of Harding’s report to make sure it would not be unfavorable to DS,” the document states.

According to the report, Šolak arranged a meeting with senior N1 staff without Sadler’s knowledge:

“DS then invited N1 Belgrade’s news director, Jugoslav Ćosić, and his executive producer, Igor Božić, to travel to Slovenia for a meeting with him and N1’s CEO, Aleksandra Subotić. Sadler was not notified in advance. When he found out, he asked to attend. Šolak said the meeting was ‘mentoring’ and ‘parental,’ but in reality it was an editorial session entirely under DS’s control—as the owner of N1. From that point on, Sadler began to accept that internal reform at N1 would be impossible without a change in the governance system.”

“The Harding Report”

In July 2018, KKR commissioned a benchmarking report on N1, in which Sadler fully participated alongside James Harding, the former head of BBC News. Before the formal presentation, Harding gave Sadler an oral briefing of the main findings and recommendations at an inperson meeting in London, which he said had been approved in advance by KKR’s Ludo Bammens.

According to that oral briefing, the key recommendations were:

* Create a new position of Editorial Director, based in Luxembourg, with executive responsibility for all three centers (Croatia, Serbia, BiH). The director had to be a journalist with a proven record in toptier news. Harding suggested Sadler for the role. Sadler said he could consider it, provided the report was taken seriously, and only on a shortterm basis (perhaps 6–12 months) to leave N1 with an editorial structure capable of independent scrutiny.

* Give the Editorial Director a team of two analysts with political or media experience from the region to monitor N1’s content. Candidates could include people already working in embassies or international institutions.

* Form a new, independent Editorial Board composed of respected professionals—former editors from the BBC, Reuters, Sky News, and similar outlets.

* Have the Editorial Director also chair N1’s Editorial Board, reporting directly and personally to United Group.

* Use the new structure to transparently shield News Directors from direct shareholder influence, thereby protecting the independence of news operations within United Group.

* The N1 CEO (Aleksandra Subotić), who also sits on United Group’s board, would no longer chair daily editorial meetings and should step back from daytoday news operations, while continuing to sit on N1’s Editorial Board.

Harding said he wanted to maintain a reasonable balance at N1 through the new division of responsibilities to improve the channel. Sadler agreed.

“One of the most difficult issues raised with Harding came from Sarajevo, where the news director (Amir Zukić) said he was under pressure to follow Dragan Šolak’s (DS’s) instructions on coverage, and that he had been subjected to unfair harassment and intimidation by Chairman Šolak and CEO Subotić.

He also said his livelihood had been threatened when, over dinner after an editorial board meeting, Šolak told all the news directors they should be careful in their work, because their families could suffer if they were fired and lost their income.

Later, Harding and his colleague Kit Blekmor told Sadler they were shocked by what they had heard, and that if the director ever spoke out publicly, it could have a very negative impact on the sale of United Group.

Harding assured shareholders that his findings would be transparent and made public.

However, six months passed after the report was first presented—Sadler never saw it; despite written assurances, the Harding report was buried,” the document says.

After an eightmonth gap, a meeting of N1’s Editorial Board was suddenly scheduled by Aleksandra Subotić for December 17, 2018, in Luxembourg. DS (Dragan Šolak) did not attend.

During the meeting, when Sadler asked Subotić about the Harding report, she replied:

“There is no Harding report. What are you talking about?”

When Sadler pressed the point, she asked:

“Are you sure the report was ever presented?”

She added that it “doesn’t matter,” and closed the discussion, saying that an alleged leak to the office of Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić about the nonexistence of the Harding report was currently being handled through an “internal review.”

Before the meeting, Subotić hinted in an email to all news directors that Sarajevo was responsible for the alleged leak. Sadler replied that such unfounded accusations were inappropriate and unprofessional, the report says.

(Telegraf Biznis/Euronews Serbia)